The Retro Critic

COWBOY KID

Howdy, partners!

Time for some good ol’ fashioned NES game reviewin’!

This week, Western-themed game Cowboy Kid takes center stage as we go back to the classic Nintendo console for more retro shenanigans leaving the Commodore 64’s shocking Psycho shlock and the weird and wonderful world of Weird Dreams far behind, for the time being.

Cowboy Kid sees you play as a gunslinger who goes from town to town on various missions. Ironically, you start off without a gun but instead walk around town stabbing anyone that comes your way.

To be fair, most of the dudes you attack are armed.

Most of ’em, anyway.

Still, I can’t help but feel that some of them might not exactly deserve a knife to the face.

Or the back of the face, whatever.

Anyway, from the looks of it, every decent human being in town has retreated to their saloons and stores. So afraid of the outside world they have become that they now resort to selling absolute nonsense.

A world gone mad.

Bread lol

But it’s not all buying and killing.

No.

There’s also some killing to be done!

Wait…

I don’t even have a gun! I’m a… knifeslinger?

I’m no better than Slash Joe…

I’m worse in fact since I not only go around stabbing whoever blocks my path but WHATEVER blocks my path.

Bats:

Snakes:

Giant mice:

Worms:

How does Cowboy Kid sleep at night?

In horse dung.

I had to ask…

Of course, you eventually get a gun and put it to good use.

Hey, remember in the Old West when Clash Of The Titans happened?

Yes, that is a giant scorpion and no, I don’t know why it’s there.

The scale is all over the place in this game, and has been from the very beginning: giant mice, super-worms, trees shorter than people…

Then giant scorpion shows up and it’s no longer a matter of things not being scaled quite right, we’ve finally enter the softly demented realm of… the Western sci-fi.

Step aside Westworld and Cowboys & Aliens: there’s a new Cowboy Kid in town.

This is a weird game.

Not Weird Dreams weird but weird nonetheless.

Every so often someone shows up butt naked:

Or just without pants, spouting absurdities:

It’s all down to the simplistic graphics and my particularly twisted mind, though, so don’t let that distract you from what is actually a pretty good game.

It’s just that, well, once in a while you might look at a situation and…

… get the wrong idea.

I mean, sure it looks like Mr Kid is having too much of a good time riding those rails, and sure it kinda looks like that old guy is taking a dump:

But he’s not: YOU’RE just sick.

I kid.

I cowboy kid.

Semi-seriously though, this is a really fun game. You never get bored with it as it has enough variety, with its mini-games and its creative build-up to keep you entertained. One second you’re stabbing away Legend Of Zelda-style, buying stuff from stores and meeting all kinds of weirdos, the next you’re side-scrolling fighting Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum…

…riding a horse in a third person view…

…chilling out at a fun fair battling a second player…

… or at a shooting range practicing your aim.

It’s constantly involving and in the end, you certainly don’t feel short-changed.

There’s a lot of strange stuff in the game, including some potentially politically incorrect randomness…

But battling Wild Wolf Chief (aka “The Bad Indian”) and his pals aside, this is a game in which face-stabbing, animal cruelty and shooting anyone in sight is promoted so you can’t really nitpick it too much.

Besides, it’s a Western! You gotta have all that stuff in there! Have you never seen a John Wayne movie? Come on now.

It is a shame, though. After all, the game’s cover art promised something a little more… shall we say: Brokeback Mountainy?

All in all, Cowboy Kid falls just short of being a true forgotten NES gem, I feel. It’s still good and well worth playing but it is admittedly let down by a few annoying little things like the lack of a save feature or a password system, some goofy stereotyping and perplexing unmotivated violence.

Again, I do recommend playing the game and I think you’ll find it to be a pleasant surprise.

(also check out Nintendo Legend’s review HERE)

And so I end this review just like every Western ever made:

Nice.

*stabs horse*